ields, and the croft, and the grazing o' their kye on the
green, as Sir Bale Mardykes to the Hall up there and estate. So 'tis
nout to me, except in the way o' friendliness, what the family may think
o' me; only the George and they has always been kind and friendly, and I
don't want to break the old custom."

"Well said, Dick!" exclaimed Doctor Torvey; "I own to your conclusion;
but there ain't a soul here but ourselves--and we're all friends, and
you are your own master--and, hang it, you'll tell us that story about
the drowned woman, as you heard it from your father long ago."

"Ay, do, and keep us to our liquor, my hearty!" cried the Captain.

Mr. Peers looked his entreaty; and deaf Mr. Hollar, having no interest
in the petition, was at least a safe witness, and, with his pipe in his
lips, a cozy piece of furniture.

Richard Turnbull had his punch beside him; he looked over his shoulder.
The door was closed, the fire was cheery, and the punch was fragrant,
and all friendly faces about him. So said he:

"Gentlemen, as you're pleased to wish it, I don't see no great harm in
it; and at any rate, 'twill prevent mistakes. It is more than ninety
years since. My father was but a boy then; and many a time I have heard
him tell it in this very room."

And looking into his glass he mused, and stirred his punch slowly.

CHAPTER II

The Drowned Woman

"It ain't much of a homminy," said the host of the George. "I'll not
keep you long over it, gentlemen. There was a handsome young lady, Miss
Mary Feltram o' Cloostedd by name. She was the last o' that family; and
had gone very poor. There's but the walls o' the house left now; grass
growing in the hall, and ivy over the gables; there's no one livin' has
ever hard tell o' smoke out o' they chimblies. It stands on t'other side
o' the lake, on the level wi' a deal o' a'ad trees behint and aside it
at the gap o' the clough, under the pike o' Maiden Fells. Ye may see it
wi' a spyin'-glass from the boatbield at Mardykes Hall."

"I've been there fifty times," said the Doctor.

"Well there was dealin's betwixt the two families; and there's good and
bad in every family; but the Mardykes, in them days, was a wild lot. And
when old Feltram o' Cloostedd died, and the young lady his daughter was
left a ward o' Sir Jasper Mardykes--an ill day for her, poor
lass!--twenty year older than her he was, an' more; and nothin' about
him, they say, to make anyone like or love him, ill